Perception of self and others in healthy ageing

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Abstract

Processing information related to the self and inferring the mental state of
another person is known to involve the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) in both
younger and older adults (Stone et al., 2008; Kelley et al., 2002; Hynes et al., 2006;
Ruby et al., 2009). According to the dorsolateral prefrontal (DLPF) theory of cognitive
ageing, processing of the self should not be affected by healthy adult ageing as functions
related to the VMPFC remain relatively preserved compared to functions related to the
DLPF cortex (MacPherson et al., 2002). Similarly, no age difference should emerge in
those tasks thought to tap functions of the VMPFC. The aim of this PhD is to investigate
the effect of healthy adult ageing on the ability to process information related to the self
and others. A series of experiments was designed to compare the performance of
younger and older adults on tasks that investigate processing and retrieval of self-related
information (e.g. behaviour prediction, personality judgement, mental state inferences,
self-referential). The tasks differ in the extent to which they rely on cognitive effort. The
results show that ageing does not affect self-related judgements. A further series of
experiments designed to investigate affective and cognitive Theory of Mind (ToM) show
that the affective performance, thought to rely on VMPFC activity, is not affected by
age. In contrast, the performance of older participants differs from that of younger adults
on cognitive ToM task, thought to involve DLPFC brain areas. A final experiment
investigated the ability to make self versus other related judgments in a confabulating
patient. The results show that the ability to reflect on the self but not on others was
intact. In summary, the findings demonstrate that processing self-information and
making ToM inferences remains intact in older individuals and is not overtly impaired
by confabulation.